The Bansfield Benefice is the collective name for the Parishes of Cowlinge, Denston, Lidgate, Ousden, Stansfield, Stradishall and Wickhambrook in the Diocese of St Edmundbury and Ipswich, Suffolk, United Kingdom.

Friday, November 1, 2013

I remember vividly one of the first primary school assemblies I took, about this time of year. I was drawing oval faces small and large in a great crowd to illustrate the story of Jesus’ ‘sermon on the mount’ his teaching the crowds who gathered to hear his word. What can you see I asked – ‘fireworks’ came the reply and that was the end of my carefully prepared assembly.

November begins with the commemoration of so many people through All Saints', All Souls' and Remembrance. Some such lives burn as bright as fireworks against the darkness of this world’s trials, and others brightly light more personably our own lives by the light of the loves we shared. So the language of our faith story offers encouragement against the lengthening nights, this month closing with the assurance that in crowning our Christ King in our lives, His light will always shine to guide our path in His Way.

My niece at this time is walking the Way, joining the millions of pilgrims who have sought to draw closer to their guiding light, our sovereign Christ, along the Camino, the Way to Santiago de Compostela, shrine of the Apostle St James. Her ‘Twitter’ diary posts are lit by those fellow pilgrims she meets, whether she is able to share conversation with them or not as every tribe and nation meets along the Way is no matter, for her encouragement is that others too share her vision of arrival.

Such truly is the company of our life’s pilgrimage, to be one peoples in crowning our Christ our Saviour joins us to the universal, timeless throng who through the ages follow the Way he taught, that all roads should lead to that Daystar Dawn of God’s Kingdom come. May this month find us all encouraged to know our belonging each to the other all villages and nations, may our fireworks remind us to look for that goodly light, our daystar to lead through our winter’s darkness to that new brightening day of hope, God’s kingdom come.